The centenary of the launch of the Comet,' the first
steam- ship built in the United Kingdom for passenger traffic, was fittingly celebrated as a public holiday on Clydeside last Saturday. Henry Bell, the constructor of the ' Comet,' was anticipated by Symington, who built a steam tug to ply on the Forth and Clyde Canal in 1802, and in regard to his engines he owed even more to the American, Fulton, whose steamboat was constructed in 1807 ; none the less the ' Comet' was the first British steam vessel adapted for passenger traffic and maritime navigation, and as such was the true parent of the Clyde shipping industry of to-day. In proposing "The Memory of Henry Bell" at a luncheon given by the Corpora- tion of Glasgow on Saturday last, Mr. McKinnon Wood, Secretary for Scotland, reminded his bearers that Bell, like Fulton and Symington, died in poverty, and would have died in want had not the Clyde Trustees allowed him a pension of £100 a year. The Clyde, he continued, had never lost the prestige it owed to Bell's prescience, courage, and indomitable tenacity of purpose.
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